20 Years Later (20 page)

“This is not good,” Erin muttered.

The Red Lady held up her hand. “Tell me about this … ‘Giant.'”

Zane related the story to her, too busy editing out Dev and getting the rest of the details right to see that he now commanded her full attention. He went on to tell her about when Lyssa was taken and the lightning. “Until today, I didn't think that the Giant was connected at all,” he concluded.

Titus said nothing while the Red Lady drifted over to one of the windows, letting the voile brush her cheek as she looked
out into the courtyard. There was a slight tremor of her hand as she rested it on the windowsill.

“Is that where the dream ended?” she finally asked.

Titus nodded and then quietly added, “Yes.”

The sounds of the people outside training and working crept into the room to mingle with the heavy silence within. Zane worried that he'd said too much, that the Giant was planning to steal his mother next, and that now Erin wasn't safe either. After a long pause, the Red Lady turned and looked at Titus.

“I'll help you to get your sister back,” she stated simply. All three children responded with a wide-eyed silence. “I'll see to it that my people keep their eyes open when hunting. Any information you receive, pass onto me and when we have a location, my best Hunters will help you retrieve her.” There was no coy smile, no teasing glance, only determination.

Titus finally managed to find his tongue. “Thank you.”

She nodded. “You may leave now, but Erin, I want you to stay behind a moment.”

Zane considered whether to risk a kiss, but somehow the atmosphere seemed too serious to try it. “See you soon,” he said hopefully, earning only a brief smile and nod from the Red Lady. He suppressed a sigh and followed Titus from the room.

No opportunity for the three to talk in private presented itself for the rest of the day, and so that night, Zane and Erin were pulled into the dream room. At first there was an awkward silence until Erin stuffed her hands in her pockets and leant against the windowsill, stating, “Well, something weird is going on. With the Red Lady I mean.” That piqued Zane's interest in particular. Erin continued, “The Red Lady never, ever offers to do anything for someone outside of the gang unless it's a deal.”

Titus raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

Erin nodded. “She didn't make you promise anything in return for helping you find Lyssa, did she?” When he shook his head, she spread her hands. “There you go then. Weird.”

Zane frowned. “Not weird,
kind
.”

This time Erin's eyebrows were raised. “The Red Lady, kind? Hah!”

“Why not?” Zane retorted, angered by Erin's sarcastic tone. “Maybe she just wants to help.”

Erin chose not to reply, simply rolling her eyes. Zane looked to Titus for support but the boy merely shrugged his shoulders.

“I don't know, or care, what her motivation is. I just want to get Lyssa back. And Zane, next time, try to be more careful about what you say … telling her about what happened to Lyssa meant you had to talk about Jay … I don't think Jay would like that.”

Zane stuffed his hands in his pockets, hunched his shoulders, and began to gently kick at one of the legs of the captain's chair in frustration. “I thought it was important that she knew what happened. If people were more open, things would be much easier.”

“Told your mum about the Giant yet then?” Erin asked, making Zane blush and scowl. “Thought so,” she muttered.

The three fell back into silence, Zane hating the tension between them. He understood that Titus was tense about Lyssa, but he couldn't understand why Erin was so negative until he recalled a question he'd been wanting to ask her all day.

“Why did the Red Lady want to see you alone? Is that why you're grumpy?”

“I'm not grumpy!” Erin snapped, but when she saw Zane's concern, she deflated and perched on the edge of the captain's chair with a long sigh. “Sorry Zane. I shouldn't give you a hard time because you're soft.” Zane didn't know whether
to be insulted or accept the apology, so he just let it go. She continued, “I'm not sure if I'm allowed to talk about what the Red Lady said.”

Titus frowned. “Why?”

Erin shifted nervously. “Because neither of you is in her gang.”

“Neither are you,” Zane pointed out and she nodded.

“True … but she wants me to be … and soon.”

The boys looked at each other. Zane couldn't quite understand why, but the idea of that made him uncomfortable and Titus seemed to feel the same way.

“I'm not sure though,” she continued. “I really like it there, and she's really tough and I like that. And Father thinks that I should be in it–there's no doubt for him that I should–but …”

Her voice trailed off and Titus picked up the thread. “But it might make it harder for us?”

She looked up at him standing by the window and nodded. “Yeah … I mean, it's already hard living near the Bloomsbury Boys, cos when you go over there they won't let me go in with you because of who my father is. And he keeps telling me they're horrible, but I can't see why if they're your friends, Zane. I can't see you getting on with horrible people. You're too nice.”

Zane smiled half-heartedly, his eyes still sad.

“And if I join the Red Lady's gang,” she continued, “then it might make it even harder for me to spend time with you, especially when your training is over. And that might be soon cos Dad's desperate to move back to her place. Then I might not see you much at all.”

They all thought about this. “I like seeing you every day,” Zane said quietly. “It feels right for us to be close together. Even when things are hard, like at the moment.”

Both Titus and Erin agreed strongly. “And you're the first real friends I've ever had,” Erin added sadly.

“I think gangs are stupid,” Titus announced forcefully, making the other two look at him in surprise. “There must be another way for people to survive. Lyssa and I got by fine without any gangs for years. It's much better that way.”

“But there were only two of you,” Zane said. “And you didn't have a big garden to worry about protecting.”

Titus sighed. “That's true, but I still don't like the idea of people feeling like they can't say things just because of what someone else might do about it.” He looked at Erin. “You know that would get worse if you joined them?”

Erin didn't say anything, but she nodded after a few moments.

“Didn't you and Lyssa ever think about joining a gang?” Zane asked. “It must have been hard … it would've been safer to be in one.”

Titus shook his head. “No, never. We stayed away from them. Lyssa said that it was better to be free and do what we wanted when we wanted.” He looked pointedly at Erin. “If you joined, and the Red Lady didn't want you to see us anymore, you'd have to do what she said.”

Erin turned away and Zane stepped forward. “We don't have to worry about that now,” he said, desperate to alleviate the tension. “Do we? Or did the Red Lady say something about it happening soon?”

After a long pause, Erin spoke. “She asked if we were all getting along ok. I said we were, but I didn't say much more than that. You have to be careful around gang leaders.” She looked pointedly at Zane. “She said that I'd settled in well and that Luthor said I'd be a good Hunter one day. She said that she was always looking for strong people to join her gang, but that I had to forget my life before. That I should only look to the future or something like that. I said I couldn't just forget my mum, but then she went all cold and said that of all people, she was the one I should try hardest to forget.”

Zane gasped. “She said that? But no-one should ever be told to do that! Mums are the best things in the world!”

Titus turned and looked out at the strange oak tree. Erin sighed. “I asked her why, but she wouldn't answer. She said it wasn't my place to question her … which is right I suppose. But I couldn't just let it go … and I felt angry … I said that my mum was in just as much trouble as Lyssa so why couldn't we help my mum too?”

Titus looked back at her. “That was brave.”

Erin shrugged. “Stupid more like. I just lost my temper … it wasn't fair. She was so nice to you about Lyssa–why be so mean about my mum?”

She fell quiet. Zane went over to her and very slowly reached out and touched her hand. She looked up at him and tried to manage a smile but it didn't quite work.

“How did it end?” Titus asked.

“She said that normally she'd have someone thrown out onto the street for answering back like I had, but that she'd give me another chance, seeing as I was new to it all and because of who my father is.” She glanced at Zane. “She didn't say it very kindly either.”

“I suppose she was angry too,” he replied half-heartedly.

She looked down at the floor. “I asked Father about Mum.”

Titus turned back to look at her. “I suspect that didn't go well.”

Erin began to bite one of her fingernails. “He said I wasn't allowed to talk about her. That she was a terrible person, and that she deserved everything she got, and if I ever spoke about her again he'd be very angry. He said I was lucky that he was willing to give me a chance even though she's my mother.”

Her lip trembled and she hurriedly started to chew on a second nail. Zane squeezed her other hand sympathetically and looked to Titus with concern.

“It sounds like he thinks she did something in the past,” Titus commented.

“She couldn't have!” Erin exclaimed, suddenly angry. “Mum hardly says anything, she just sits there for hours or cries or stays in bed. How could she have done anything bad?”

“Maybe she wasn't always like that,” Titus theorised, so caught up in the puzzle that he forgot her distress. “And she must have known Luthor before, to have made you with him. So where was she when she knew Luthor?”

Zane cleared his throat and frowned at Titus to make him aware of his insensitivity. Titus realised this quickly and fell silent.

“No-one deserves to be left with the Gardners,” Zane said softly. “I wouldn't want my mum to ever be unhappy. I'm sorry it's all so horrible.”

Erin shrugged. “It's better than it used to be.” She looked over at Titus. “Sorry … we should be talking about the Giant and your dream about Lyssa, not my stuff.”

“I did want to talk about it a bit,” Titus admitted. “I want us to go back to the hospital.” Seeing Zane's dismay, he continued. “I have to find out more about the Giant and what he was doing there. I think it's … interesting that he was in your dad's room.”

Erin gasped. “Maybe the Giant is your dad, Zane!”

Zane shook his head. “No, my dad's dead.”

“Is he?” Titus said pointedly and Zane began to pick at the thread on the hem of his trousers. “We talked about that. Miri's lying–I think he's still alive.”

“I'm right, then!” Erin grinned but Zane shook his head again.

“No, it wasn't him. I'm sure of it. He would have tried to speak to me, surely. And anyway, I'd be taller if I was a Giant's son.”

Erin shrugged. “Whatever. I still think I'm right.”

“In the pictures he doesn't look tall enough to be a Giant, relative to the other people in them,” Titus added and she sighed, nodding in capitulation. He frowned. “We need to go back to that room and see if we can find out more about him though. And the Giant … maybe we could find something that will give us a clue to find the Unders. First chance we get, we go, agreed?”

Erin nodded and then Zane did too, albeit reluctantly. “But in the morning,” Zane added. “Can you meet me in the garden before we start training? There's something I want to do. It's important.”

The next day was the first that suggested the end of the summer. A cold wind blew grey clouds across the sky and prompted Miri to unpack jumpers and blankets from their summer storage.

Zane found it impossible to settle to anything, constantly looking to the corner of the square to see if Jay and Callum had arrived before the morning training was due to start. When he caught sight of them, he beckoned them towards the garden and hurried into the house.

“Mum,” he called, “Can you come to the garden?”

She followed him outside. “What's wrong?”

“Nothing,” he said, seeing Erin enter the garden with Titus and, to his surprise, Luthor.

Luthor picked up on this, Zane still unable to mask his feelings. “Erin said something important was going to happen, so I thought I should be here.”

Erin gave Zane an apologetic look, but he smiled good-naturedly, doing his best to ignore the tension between Jay and Luthor who stood as far away from each other as they could in the small gathering.

Miri smiled at Callum and Jay, and then looked quizzically at her son.

“Thanks for coming, everyone,” Zane began. “I wanted you all to be here because I'm going to do something that's very important to me. It's an idea I had a while ago, it just took some time to find out the things I need to know.” He glanced around at the group. “A long time ago, there were people called doctors,” he began, not noticing Miri tense up. “Titus read about them, and when he told me more about what they were like, I decided that I wanted to be one too.”

Both Callum and Luthor raised their eyebrows in surprise; like Miri, they were old enough to remember the time before
It happened and were no doubt curious to see where this was going.

“Doctors were nice people who made people better, knew lots about bodies, and took a special oath.”

He glanced at Titus who gently prompted him, “The Hippocratic oath.”

“Yes, that's the one,” Zane continued. “Me and Mum already try to make people better.” He smiled at Miri, who looked back at him affectionately. “And Titus has found me some more books so I can learn what all the things in the body are called. So that just leaves the oath. Some bits of it didn't make much sense, so I wrote my own version that has the most important bits in it. I'd like to take it in front of you all, just like a proper oath, so you can all see how much this means to me.”